


Tricks and Dares

by mandykaysfic



Series: 12 Days of Christmas 2017 [5]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Stargate, Brotherly Bonding, Brothers, Dare, Food, Gen, Kid Fic, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-03
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-02-27 17:07:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13252743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mandykaysfic/pseuds/mandykaysfic
Summary: John knows little brothers are fun to play tricks on.





	Tricks and Dares

**Author's Note:**

> Written for lj's 12 Days of Christmas 
> 
> On the third day of Christmas my true love gave to me
> 
> _Three submarines_

John examined his sand island with the critical eye of a seven-years old expert town planner. He added a few more pebbles to the wall closest to the sea, the West Wall, he mentally designated. It was late enough in the afternoon that the wall created a four-inch strip of shadow, perfect for the jelly fish. He had eight in his bucket; now it was time to put them in their new home.

"Whatcha doin', John?"

"Nothing." Why hadn't Dave stayed in the water longer? "How come you're not still swimming?"

"Katie said I'd been in long enough."

John turned around to where the bright yellow and red striped umbrella had been stuck in the sand, marking the spot their nanny had claimed for the Sheppard boys and herself. Katie lay on her towel, flicking through a magazine. She looked up and waved at John. He knew what that meant. Dave was only four and John would have to let him play sand islands while Katie read about make-up and girls' stuff, but she'd buy them an ice-cream before they went home.

"Okay. You make a sand hill here with that." John pointed first to a spot on the eastern side of his island and then to some sand he'd dampened with the right amount of water so that a shape would hold together. He made sure Dave followed his directions before picking up his bucket of jelly fish.

He'd barely put one into place when a little voice said again, "Whatcha doin', John?"

"Working," he responded gruffly.

"What's them?"

"Jelly fish. Have you finished the sand hill?"

"All done. See?" said Dave proudly. "What'cha doin' with the jelly fish? Can I help?"

The sand hill was smaller than John had planned. He'd wanted to get all of the jelly fish in position by himself.

"Where's the colored ones?" Dave held out one of the transparent moon jellies he'd picked out of John's bucket.

"What colored ones?"

"You know. The red jelly and the green jelly and the yellow jelly ones. These ones got no colour."

"Oh," John thought rapidly, and grinned when an idea popped into his brain. "The man in the shop adds the color. I'm making a jelly shop for my island." Quickly he lined up the jelly fish where he'd planned, graciously allowing Dave to put the one he held down last. "Now I'll be the shop keeper and you can buy my jellies."

John took up his place behind the stone wall. "Yes, Mr Customer, how may I help you today?" he asked, deepening his voice as much as possible.

"I want to buy a jelly," announced Dave importantly.

"We have raspberry, lime and pineapple jellies today."

"I'll have raspberry," decided Dave, hurriedly adding a please and thank you when John glared at him. Their dad insisted on good manners at all times.

"That will be two shells, please."

Dave handed over two shells and accepted a jelly fish in return.

"It's our best raspberry flavor," said John encouragingly.

"That's my favorite flavor," said Dave, and bit his clear raspberry jelly in half.

John rolled around on the sand, laughing gleefully as Dave spat out the sandy jelly and burst into loud wails.

Katie rushed over to investigate. She helped Dave rinse his mouth out and hustled him over to the life guard, who reassured her the moon jellies weren't poisonous and when dried, could be found in Asian dishes.  
John decided he would rather have eaten a jelly fish than be deprived of ice cream for a week. Dave didn't eat any kind of jelly for a long time.

*

"We should check and make sure," said John earnestly. "it's only fair to Fluffy."

Aunt Moira had presented her nephews with Fluffy for Christmas. The long-haired cat was to be their responsibility. Eight and five were old enough to prove they were capable of caring for an animal, she told Patrick. He'd suggested dogs or horses as more suitable for his sons, but Aunt Moira remained firm. A cat was an ideal first pet for the boys.

John read a chapter to Dave every night from 'Caring for Your Cat', which had accompanied Fluffy, along with a selection of cat toys and a variety of food to tempt a fussy palate. Manfully, he took on the job of emptying Fluffy's litter tray without complaint. Dave gathered up Fluffy's toys every night and put them away, even though he left his own cars and trucks scattered throughout the house.

John and Dave stood before the cupboard in the laundry where Fluffy's essentials were kept. Boxes of dried food labelled fish, chicken and beef stood on the second shelf.

"See here, Dave. As it's my turn to feed Fluffy tonight, I'll put a little bit of each one on a plate. You shut your eyes, then pretend you are Fluffy and try each one. Then we will know whether the cat food people are telling the truth. It will be just like that show on TV," said John excitedly. "If they're not, we could write to complain and then we'd get com-pen-say-shun," he pronounced carefully.

"Miaow!" replied Dave, plainly charmed with the idea. He didn't know exactly what com-pen-say-shun was, but it would be fun to be on TV. He closed his eyes and stuffed his fingers in his ears as well.

"Here you are, Fluffy." John poked Dave. Three piles of dried cat food lay on one of Fluffy's plates.

"Miaow!" Dave got down on his hands and knees. He stuck out his tongue and tried to lick some of the kibble. All he succeeded in doing was flicking a few pieces onto the floor. With a quick glance up at John, Dave used his fingers.

"Miaow!" he said when he finished crunching.

"Well? Which one is it."

"Miaow."

"Dave...."

"Fish," answered Dave hurriedly in human.

"I'd better not tell you whether you're right," said John as he considered what he knew about experiments. "Try the next one."

"Miaow...I mean, chicken," said Dave

"And the last one."

"Yuck! That's disgusting. Fluffy shouldn't have to eat that."

"That's the beef. You got them all right."

"Cook never made beef that tasted like that." Dave rubbed his mouth, and then spying Fluffy's water bowl, crawled over and drank until the nasty taste had mostly gone away.

John made Dave clean up the kibble he'd spat out, while he put the boxes of chicken and fish bits away. He tipped the remainder of the beef kibble into the bin. Cook bemoaned the fussiness of cats in general and Fluffy in particular, but stopped buying beef kibble when the boys informed her Fluffy no longer ate it. They forgot about asking for com-pen-say-shun when their dad took them to the stables to show them the new pony that was to be theirs.

=

"Try these, Dave." John held out a white paper bag.

Dave eyed the contents suspiciously. "What are they?" The small, dried, red things didn't look nice. At seven years of age, he'd grown wise to some of John's tricks.

"They're a Vietnamese sweet. My friend from school, you've met him, Vinh, he gave me some."

John proffered the bag again.

Dave took three, and popped them into his mouth. “Aargh!”

“Ha ha! Tricked you! I wish I had a camera. You should see your face!” John laughed as Dave’s eyes watered and his face grew scarlet. 

“You poisoned me!” Dave cried when he could speak. He rubbed his burning tongue and mouth with the back of his hand after spitting the dried chillies at John.

“Nah. You’ll be okay. Truly.”

Cook made Dave drink a glass of milk, explaining it would ease the fiery sensation more efficiently than water. She made Dave an especially bland chicken casserole for dinner. John, on the other hand, found his dinner extra spicy. Their father insisted on perfect manners at the dinner table, so if he didn’t want to be sent to eat in the kitchen for a week, he would have to eat it all. Manfully, he choked it down, hoping all the while Dave would be sent from the table for the occasional snort he couldn’t muffle in his napkin.

=

“Go on.” Dave held out a piece of fish he’d sliced from his catch. "I dare you."

John wrinkled his nose. The tricks he’d played on Dave had segued into ongoing alternating dares, usually food related, but not always. John had broken his arm when he tried to land on a couple of old mattresses after jumping off the roof when Dave suggested John would make a good stunt double for a teenaged television star. Dave had knocked out his front teeth sliding down the back staircase on a tray; the winter Olympics had inspired the brothers, with John encouraging Dave to try out an indoor version of skeleton bobsledding. Mostly they dared one another to eat the most disgusting or bizarre combinations of food they could devise.

“Raw fish is a Japanese delicacy. It’s called slushy.” Dave waved the fish in John’s face.

“I think you mean _sushi_.”

“Sushi, slushy, mushy, fussy. I dare you!”

John held the fish between his thumb and forefinger. It was quite a thick piece, but he was reasonably certain he could swallow it down without gagging or choking. “Did you take out all the bones?”

“Yeah, at least I think so.”

John pulled a face. “Past the teeth and over the gums, look out stomach, here it comes,” he chanted. With his head tilted back and mouth open, he dropped the fish into his mouth. Gagging briefly, he straightened up in a hurry and managed to safely swallow the fish.

“That’s disgusting. It better not be poisonous. Just you wait. I’ll think of something truly awful for you. See if I don’t,” promised John.

*

“ _If your baby leaves you, and you`ve had a tale to tell  
Just take a walk down Lonely Street to Heartbreak Hotel  
And I get so lonesome, baby,  
I get so lonesome, yeah, I get so lonesome I could die._”

Dave sang along with Elvis, swivelling his hips and swinging his arm. 

“Kitchen. Now!” interrupted John as he thrust his head into Dave’s room. “I’ve been down to the shop and bought what we need. Cook’s out, so we’re safe for a while.”

Dave turned off his radio and followed John to the kitchen. On the bench lay two large loaves of bread, a stick of butter, two jars of peanut butter, two jars of grape jelly and a whole lot of bacon. 

"I got enough for us to have one each," explained John.

"But you dared me to eat Elvis' submarine sandwich."

"I know, but I thought about it, and compared to snails, octopus and shark meat, it doesn't sound too bad."

"So what do we do?"

"You cook the bacon. I'll handle the rest." John had already turned the oven on. He buttered the top of the loaves and set them into the oven to bake. "It's supposed to be margarine, but Cook always says butter is better, so I got that."

It didn't take long for the crust to brown up. After sawing each loaf in half, he scooped out the middles. Dave grabbed a handful of the warm bread.

"Mmm. It's nicer than toast."

"Don't eat that now. You've got all this." The hollowed-out center of each loaf held the contents of a jar of peanut butter and a jar of jelly. "Now for the bacon. Half each."

"It's rather large," said Dave doubtfully. "Maybe would should have made one between us."

"It's an Elvis sub," said John. "Besides the dare is to eat a whole one. Ready?"

"You go first."

"No, you go first."

"Together, then?"

"Together. Three. Two. One!"

The boys bit down simultaneously. They chewed thoughtfully.

"It's not as bad as it sounded," decided Dave.

"Bacon makes everything better," mumbled John in agreement. 

"You owe me," he groaned, when all that was left were crumbs. "Something with bacon next time, okay?"

"Uh huh." Even as his stomach rebelled against the volume he'd consumed, Dave began thinking about something suitably awful he could dare John to eat. 

END

**Author's Note:**

> The elder of my two younger brothers made a jelly fish island, and ate the jelly fish. He also taste tested cat food. And snails he collected in a bucket in our back yard. I'm sorry to say I made my sister eat dried chillies. She made that brother eat them, and he did the same to our youngest brother.


End file.
